


Sauntering Vaguely Downwards

by missmeparadox



Series: The Restless Series [1]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Chronic Illness, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Hurt/Comfort, Joly centric, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-05
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-09-22 03:01:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9579545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmeparadox/pseuds/missmeparadox
Summary: The thing about hypochondria, Joly has realized, is that eventually, people will see you as only that. He's had migraines (never diagnosed) since the third grade, mono twice (or perhaps just a case of senoritis in grad school), and a long history of unrelated symptoms that labeled him anxious by countless frustrated nurses. Eventually, people will stop believing you. Joly learned to keep his mouth shut, come hell or bleeding from any opening.Sometimes, though, he lets the small things slip.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A few things.
> 
> Firstly, there aren't a lot of fics in the chronic illness tag. While this isn't directly related to chronic illness, it is related to my experience with illness. Joly is one of my favorite characters in Les Mis because I loved that the fandom was great about never erasing his disability (as someone with a mobility aid who has been hospitalized many times, it was incredible). 
> 
> Secondly, if you have read any of my other works, consider this a warm up of sorts. I will be back to updating Dear Oracle and hopefully starting a new story for PJO very soon, should this sudden lapse in any serious problems in my health permit it.
> 
> Thirdly, I cannot attest for the accuracy of this fic. Last week, I was hospitalized for a minor stroke, so this is more or less a retelling of that and the pain that led up to it. Feel free to share your experiences if you have gone through something similar!

Joly, when he finds himself unable to sleep, is less surprised than he is dismissive.

The act of staying awake until dawn itself is not unusual. He's pulled his fair share of all-nighters in his day, far more than his new therapist would likely think necessary. There was always, however, the presence of a distraction during those dry university nights; Graintaire snoring in the next room, or Bossuet's similar affliction that would only be soothed by a well-narrated documentary (often on such delightfully soothing topics as rare skin conditions or supervolcanoes). Both of them were welcome, sentient noisemakers while Joly would catch up on his readings before eventually getting ready for his morning lab classes as if nothing was wrong, prepared for his inevitable crash in the afternoon. He was incredibly disappointed when his body, now on the other side of years of misuse, protested a bedtime later than 9.

At the ripe age of thirty-one, the disruption of his new standards are more of a nuisance than anything at first.

"I can't sleep," he says to Bossuet on the drive to the vegan ice cream place two blocks from their place, "and I hate almond milk."

Musichetta frowns from her seat beside him. Once again, Bossuet has offered to 'chauffeur' them for the evening to save the awkward shuffle of who gets to sit alone in the backseat. "Real milk hates you, dearest. You can have the nut milk, or you can have the couch to fart on."

Joly wrinkles his nose. "Don't say nut milk."

"What do you mean you can't sleep?" Bossuet is frowning where he knows Joly can see him in the mirror. His shrug probably doesn't translate well, Joly thinks, but he doesn't offer another response.

"We can pick up some pills on the way back, if you want?" Chetta rubs his arm, and it takes him a moment to realize that he hasn't felt it.

He does not tell them that, while he wasn't sleeping, he spent hours pricking at the skin of his forearm with his house key, holding his panic attack at arms-length at the realization that there was nothing; no pinch. He doesn't tell them, and doesn't know why.

"Sounds good," He shrugs again, for only her to see, "The turn is up here."

The spell is broken. Musichetta only tightens her grip on his arm, and Bossuet twists the wheel so that they swerve across two empty lanes into a side street, and Joly feels his stomach slide wetly against his ribs. The question is forgotten almost as quickly as it was introduced.

* * *

 

The thing about hypochondria, Joly has realized, is that eventually, people will see you as only that. He's had migraines (never diagnosed) since the third grade, mono twice (or perhaps just a case of senoritis in grad school), and a long history of unrelated symptoms that labeled him anxious by countless frustrated nurses. Eventually, people will stop believing you. Joly learned to keep his mouth shut, come hell or bleeding from any opening.

Sometimes, though, he lets the small things slip.

"I haven't been sleeping." He admits under the cloud of cigarette smoke encircling his head.

"So this is what I owe the pleasure of your company to," Grantaire's smile isn't at all forced, but the knot under Joly's chest isn't at all lessened either, "Hey babe, we've got company!"

Jehan is a far cry from what Joly would call an ideal housemate, but he and graintaire seemed to have struck the perfect balance between enabling and protecting eachother from their own vices, if the equal spread of AA pamphlets and mint Oreos was any indication. He also seemed to have an allergy to wearing pants before four p.m.

"You can't call me babe unless you plan on proposing in the near future." Jehan's long legs always seemed to enter the room before he did, stocking-clad and shockingly dark against them. Grantaire whistled.

"I wouldn't give it more than six months," Joly chimes in, if just to say something. There's a practiced ease to their banter that begs invitation.

"I'd stay for his insurance alone," Jehan settles heavily on the couch beside him, long legs already swinging into Joly's lap to pin him to the cushions, "what ails you, friend?"

"I can't sleep." Joly's mouth sounds like it's been stuffed with cotton. There's a deer skull with ornately decorated antlers mounted above Grantaire's head, and he can't decide who should feel worse in the situation; him, or the bedazzled carcass.

"Maybe you're getting sick again?" Jehan shrugs, "I was just last week."

Grantaire adds something to that, some anecdote about Jehan and a bewildered hospital aide, but it gets lost in the rush of blood roaring past Joly's ears at the mention of illness.

"I need to use your bathroom." He practically shouts the statement, effectively cutting off whatever he wasn't hearing Graintaire say. Jehan, bless him, cautiously lifts his tree limb legs high enough for Joly to shimmy off of the couch and wind his way past piled canvases in the hallway to the privacy of a locked door.

His friends, thankfully, don't mention it to Bossuet when he arrives to collect Joly twenty minutes later.

* * *

 

"Oh" Feuilly says from above him. Eponine is standing behind him, somewhere, but Joly can't remember ending up on the floor.

They're having some sort of party- Gavroche had just moved up into high school, and was busy destroying Grantaire at poker in the front room, if the laughter emanating from the door was any indication. Joly realizes he's spilled half a can of root beer on his shirt.

"I can't sleep," He explains, as if that can justify why he somehow went from standing to staring up at the ceiling in a matter of seconds.

"I don't think the floor is a good place to catch up, I haven't swept in ages." She smirks at the glare Joly shoots her, but still hooks her arms under his elbows. He can kind of see up her nose, but only a little, and with Feuilly's help he's hauled to a chair.

"Thanks," Joly puffs, "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

Feuilly frowned, freckles morphing into a blotchy spot in the center of his nose that Joly nearly felt his eyes cross trying to focus on.

Eponine watches the conversation carefully, hand never quite leaving the arm of the chair. If either of them told Bossuet or Musichetta, it doesn't get back to Joly.

* * *

 

"When's the last time you got any sleep?" Combeferre is whispering loudly in his face, and Joly isn't sure why they aren't as loud as everyone else in the Musain seems to be, but he whispers back anyways, "Why?"

"I haven't in, what, two days? Or like, thirty something hours." Ferre chases his mouthful of pretzels with another mouthful of the brown drink Joly's sure might kill him at the rate he's been consuming it during their conversation.

"And you thought you and Courf were ready for kids, man."

"Fucking- puppies, Joly," Ferre, deadly serious, has a piece of pretzel stuck to his face. Joly, in fact, has heard plenty of updates in the past two hours on Beatrice the Beagle. Another round of Bon Anniversarie has started up in the corner that Enjolras had parked in with Courfeyrac's homemade birthday cake at the beginning of their night out, and Joly should move to join, at least for once, the rest of his friends.

"Hey," Bossuet is over his shoulder, or maybe he's been there for longer and Joly hasn't felt it, "hey, are you hungry?"

Joly's stomach had been fighting to keep down six painkillers and a plate of pizza rolls since four. "I could eat".

There's a rolling pain in his shoulder as he stands with the rest of the group in search of takeout on the curb. Bossuet is calling for a cab, and Enjolras is laughing next to Joly's frozen ear, and he's never felt this cold on Bastille Day before.

The fireworks behind them echo with the slam of the taxi doors. His head is pounding like there's something inside he can't see yet. Joly holds his breath, counts to ten.

* * *

 

He waits two more weeks before asking for a professional opinion that isn't his own, but forgets the reason why he avoided his general practitioners office on Friday's to begin with.

"For godssake, Joly, when was the last time you got some sleep?"

Joly, perched uncomfortably on the examination table in front of the unfathomably collected Cosette Fauchelevant, robotically recites the answers he had given to the previous nurse. Sleep for five hours with the aid of medication. No fever. A full, brimming pain over the side of his head. Allergic to cats, tree nuts, dairy, and uncertainty. There's a definite certainty to the steady check check check of her pen against the clipboard, but the tension between Cosette's brow is what throws Joly for a loop.

He knows that face. It means another night with his house key.

"What did the doctor say?" He's been making a fine mess of his tingling forearms with his fingernails in the time between the various tests she had been fetching for him. Some of the patterns look a bit like the swirls Grantaire used to make in college, Van Gogh style. If Cosette sees them, or notices the comparison, or how his hands are shaking, she makes no move to ask.

"Your labs are fine, but you are slightly dehydrated," she clicks her pen and casts him a look that reminds him of his own mother, and realizes that maybe pregnancy is as scary as Marius had described it to be, "and you look absolutely exhausted. Call me and I'll come by tomorrow, anything you need?"

The cotton feeling returns. He swallows a gulp of dry air, shakes his head, and reaches for his pants.

She sends him away with a script for stronger pain medication, something that, she adds, may cause drowsiness and slight goosebumps. The side effect sounds ridiculous until he takes them at dinner time and spends the evening half asleep between his significant others, legs pimpled with an invisible cold. October looms over their tiny apartment already, and Chetta meticulously layers blankets on him until the shivering stops.

The pain, if anything, bears down greater, but the sleep is a welcome relief.

* * *

 

Joly is, not for the first time, awakened by Bahorel's cat chewing on his glasses. All attempts to sit up from his spot on the couch leave a shooting, almost electric pain down the right side of his body.

His mother would warn him about the pain scale in emergency rooms when he was younger, because he would describe every pain as a perfect ten. He wishes he could call her, but the thought dissolves like soap suds in his mind.

"Oh, you're up. I didn't want to make you miss any sleep," Enjolras sounds far more distant than just the other end of the futon Joly vaguely remembers crashing on at some point in the party. The voices on the television are clear, but may as well be speaking backwards.

"Ah," Joly says, because he is a soon to be doctor and an adult and his face is entirely numb.

Enjolras seems to notice something that Joly cannot (he looks scared, like he can feel the cold running down his spine, too) and calls for Combeferre. The noises of the other room could be five yards or five light years away as he feels his friend prod at his closed eyes, tell him to force a smile as big as he can that only stretches a centimeter.

"Ah, aha. Boba-sway." Combeferre, pale at the sight of Joly speaking with what looks like half of the control of his tongue, shoos Enjolras out of the room and dials the emergency line.

The cheering from Bahroel's living room as the ball drops, as the new year begins, may as well be happening to someone else, another set of detached ears. Bossuet slides into the room in his socks, dark and wild eyed, and knocks a pile of books to the floor. With the cheering, it sounds something like applause.

Joly sleeps.

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
